Mary Bomberger Brown, research assistant professor and program coordinator at the Tern and Plover Conservation Partnership, will present "A Species of Special Conservation Concern Occupying Anthropogenic Habits: Studies of Piping Plovers in the Great Plains" at 3:30 p.m., Dec. 9 in the Hardin Hall auditorium (Room 107). The seminar is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be provided.
Because of their status under the United States Endangered Species Act, Piping Plovers (Charadrius melodus) are intensively managed across their range. Historically, they nested on expanses of sand adjacent to water with little human interference, however, they are now commonly nesting on human-impacted and anthropogenic landscapes.
In the Great Plains, these landscapes are privately-owned residential or industrial properties (aggregate mines), human recreational areas (reservoirs and public beaches) and natural or engineered sandbars. Using capture-recapture and PVA modeling, behavioral observations and interactive human surveys, we are coming to understand how these birds utilize anthropogenic landscapes. This information is used to understand how they, the landscapes, and the associated humans, can be best monitored, managed and protected to achieve the goal of species recovery and delisting.
Bomberger Brown joined the Tern and Plover Conservation Partnership as Program Coordinator in 2007. The Partnership, based in the School of Natural Resources, was established in 1999 as a cooperative endeavor by the University of Nebraska, the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, the aggregate mining industry, and the Nebraska Environmental Trust.
More details at: http://go.unl.edu/tzo4